‘Renfield’ Review: Drained
15.04.2023 - 22:15
/ metroweekly.com
Dracula, where he’s been memorably portrayed by greats like Alexander Granach (in 1922’s silent Nosferatu), Dwight Frye (as a wide-eyed madman in 1931’s Dracula), and Tom Waits (chewing the scenery, and bugs, in 1992’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula), Renfield is perpetually overshadowed by the blood-sucking count.Universal’s new Renfield (★★☆☆☆), a big-budget spinoff of the Dracula story, set in present-day New Orleans, promises to give the character his overdue shine. Unfortunately, the film is an overcooked clash of genre and tepid grasps at modernization, whose greatest asset is — you guessed it — Dracula himself, played by a glammed-up, fang-gnashing Nicolas Cage.
There are many cooks in the kitchen — director Chris McKay, screenwriter Ryan Ridley, story writer Robert Kirkman, star Nicholas Hoult — but Cage will be the main attraction for most moviegoers.Renfield is being touted as the latest entry in Cage’s career comeback, though, like last year’s self-referential The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, it has its roots in the actor’s past. One could say Dracula is in Cage’s blood.
As a child, he was haunted by Max Schreck’s grotesque performance in the German expressionist masterpiece Nosferatu. He later paid homage to Schreck’s moves in 1989’s cult favorite Vampire’s Kiss, playing a deranged man who believes he’s turning into a vampire.In 1992, Cage was wounded when his uncle, Francis Ford Coppola, declined to give him a role in Bram Stoker’s Dracula.
“Dracula is one of my favorite characters in literature,” Cage later told a Playboy interviewer. “Much of my lifestyle is modeled after him.”Finally, Cage gets his chance.